The Rolling Jubilee project has announced that it has helped eliminate an additional $13 million of Americans’ personal debt, bringing its total to nearly $15 million in the past year. The project is run by Occupy Wall Street activists.

According to a group press release, the $14.7 million in
eliminated debt came from three different purchases. The most
recent buy was announced this week. The group bought $13.5
million of medical debt held by 2,693 people across 45 states and
Puerto Rico.

The Strike Debt group - hatched by activists from Occupy Wall Street (OWS) - created Rolling
Jubilee on November 15, 2012, following the protest movement’s
heyday in 2011. The purpose of the project is to purchase
personal debt, especially medical debt, from banks at low prices
before “abolishing” it for the individuals.

By sweeping up debt at cheap prices in the “secondary debt
market,” the project has freed $14,734,569.87 of personal
debt to date, while only spending $400,000.

“No one should have to go into debt or bankruptcy because they
get sick,” said Laura Hanna, an organizer for the group.

"We thought that the ratio would be about 20 to 1," Andrew
Ross, a member of Strike Debt, told the Guardian. He said the
group first aimed to raise $50,000, or to eliminate $1 million in
debt at the 20 to 1 ratio.

"In fact we've been able to buy debt a lot more cheaply than
that,” Ross said.

The secondary market occurs when bills, loans and the like are
consistently unpaid, and the initial lender or bank releases the
debt to a third party to cut its own losses. The sale of such
debt is usually around five cents for every dollar. The
debt-buying entity often attempts to recoup the difference from
the individual debtor for a profit.

Ross, also a professor of social and cultural analysis at New
York University, says the Rolling Jubilee project started as a
“public education project” that later bloomed into a focus
on medical debt.

"We're under no illusions that $15 million is just a tiny drop
in the secondary debt market. It doesn't make a dent in the
amount of debt.

"Our purpose in doing this, aside from helping some people
along the way – there's certainly many, many people who are very
thankful that their debts are abolished – our primary purpose was
to spread information about the workings of this secondary debt
market."

The group, which has raised over $622,000, has no control over
whose debt it purchases, given how the secondary market works.
But once the debt is purchased, the group sends the individual
debtors notices informing them that they no longer have to worry
about the debt.

In December 2012, the group sent out its first notices to
debtors.

"We write with good news: the above referenced account has
been purchased by the Rolling Jubilee Fund, a 501(c)(4)
non-profit organization. The Rolling Jubilee Fund is a project of
Strike Debt. The mission of this project is to buy and abolish
personal debt. We believe that no one should have to go into debt
for the basic things in our lives, like healthcare, housing, and
education.”

“You no longer owe the balance of this debt. It is gone, a
gift with no strings attached. You are no longer any obligation
to settle this account with the original creditor, the bill
collector, or anyone else.”

Ross says the group has received letters from thankful former
debtors, but that the larger victory is empowering debt holders
to understand the nature of the debt industry.

"Very few people know how cheaply their debts have been bought
by collectors. It changes the psychology of the debtor, knowing
this,” he told the Guardian.

“So when you get called up by the debt collector, and you're
being asked to pay the full amount of your debt, you now know
that the debt collector has bought your debt very, very cheaply.
As cheaply as we bought it. And that gives you moral ammunition
to have a different conversation with the debt collector."

The group has not been without controversy. Financial blogger
Susan Webber, using the pen name Yves Smith on her blog “Naked
Capitalism,”criticized the group for a lack of
transparency and improper operational oversight in September.

The group denied the charges, writing, “Nobody writes a check or spends
money, even for a dollar, without the input and approval of the
entire group.”

Smith replied in October, saying, “Rolling
Jubilee’s replies to our questions were and remain evasive,
legalistic, and incomplete. Now they may redeem themselves with
their promised November release of their financials and the
information about the debt purchases they say they have made. But
the jury remains out.”